the_twilight_agefandomcom-20200214-history
The Shadow Lords
There will always be a demand for spies and assassins, it’s a simple fact of politics. Whether you need to discover what an aggressive neighbor is constructing in the castle dungeons, or a merchant rival is threatening your all-important trade deals and needs to be removed, there is always call for work in the shadows. Many kingdoms have spymasters who subvert foreign servants with money and power, most merchants know how to hire thugs and sellswords with loose morals, but these are amateur efforts. The true masters of the craft are not tied to any one nation, religion or employer. They stalk the light as easily as the darkness, and take pride in the fact that once they have accepted a job, their client can consider it already done. These are the Shadow Lords. The origins of the Shadow Lords are lost in the blood of history, but however they got their start, they are now the most feared, and successful, assassins in the world. They set prices that are often very steep, the more high-profile the target the greater the cost, and they never take chances. Most often their services are contracted by merchants seeking to eliminate a competitor, but sometimes other organizations will use them. Kings have fallen to the blades of these mysterious killers, and dark secrets have been brought to light through their espionage. No one outside of the Shadow Lords knows what their organization is like, but the procedure when hiring them is usually the same. First a client puts word out among the thieves guilds that they are looking to hire the Shadow Lords. Then they wait, eventually a Shadow Lord will show up, usually in the client’s bedchamber late at night, with all security disabled or dead. The Shadow Lord then hears what their target is to be, and will lay out a price and terms. The price is non-negotiable, any attempt to argue it will result in the Shadow Lord leaving and the client being blacklisted for ten years. The terms can differ depending on how difficult the Shadow Lord thinks the mission will be. Sometimes they offer no terms, sometimes they demand years in which to accomplish a job. However, it is possible to negotiate those terms, though any such negotiation will also see a subsequent rise in the price. If the client refuses either the price or the terms, then the Shadow Lord leaves and no other will come so long as the client is still trying to hire for that mission. If the client agrees then the Shadow Lord will ask for a quarter of the payment in advance, and give instructions to the client on how to make the payment. Any client that refuses to pay either the initial sum or the full amount usually ends up quite dead and thoroughly burgled. Despite this common script, attempts to capture a live Shadow Lord have always failed. Attempts to question a dead Shadow Lord have similarly failed. They are professional, discreet, and extremely loyal to their organization. There are secret techniques that only they know which allow them to bypass almost any security measure and hide themselves perfectly. They have only failed an assassination twice, once when they were sent after a powerful Hero, and he only escaped by joining the Blood War, and the other when they were contracted to kill an Avatar of a Virtue. It is unknown if they have any political ambitions, but if they do, it is sure that they will accomplish them through stealth, espionage and assassination. Category:World Powers